joshbaskin's comments

On: Google backtracks on search results design

[joshbaskin]

I switched out to DDG as well today. See how it goes.

Any takers for trying out Bing?

[Klonoar → joshbaskin]

IIRC, if you're using DDG, you're essentially using Bing (base) + other custom engine work layered on top of it.

[mattmanser → Klonoar]

You don't remember correctly, this is a persistent falsehood I see repeated in all these sort of threads.

https://help.duckduckgo.com/duckduckgo-help-pages/results/du...

[pb7 → mattmanser]

https://help.duckduckgo.com/duckduckgo-help-pages/results/so...

“ In fact, DuckDuckGo gets its results from over four hundred sources. These include hundreds of vertical sources delivering niche Instant Answers, DuckDuckBot (our crawler) and crowd-sourced sites (like Wikipedia, stored in our answer indexes). We also of course have more traditional links in the search results, which we also source from a variety of partners, including Verizon Media (formerly Yahoo) and Bing.”

It is not false. The standard 10 links you see come directly from Bing and they don’t even attempt to hide that fact.

[dx034 → pb7]

I've seen logs of a few medium sized sites and I've never seen DuckDuckBot really crawling any of these sites. I'm sure they use their own results to supplement some parts but most of the web results still seem to come from Bing.

[Klonoar → pb7]

Thanks for digging that up. :)

[Zebfross → joshbaskin]

I’ve been using Bing for years with no regrets, but I live in the U.S. (and speak English) where I hear it is best.

[dx034 → Zebfross]

Yeah, it really has problems if you tend to search in different languages or look for regional content outside of the US.

[rahidz → joshbaskin]

I've switched to Bing for images (more filters and less safe-search) and recipes (so many options!) , but for general search I find their index to be smaller and their results less relevant than Google's.

[gpanders → joshbaskin]

Is Bing any better (as far as user privacy and tracking) than Google?

Genuine question. Bing is still owned by MS right?

[nottorp → joshbaskin]

I used Bing maps once, because, guess, Google thought they know better than me what I want.

Namely, I was planning a summer trip that included a mountain road that is closed 9 months per year due to snow. And I was doing that in spring.

Google didn't let me use that road because, right, it was closed. And people shouldn't be allowed to plan their trips 3 months in advance.

Bing gave me the same results without the nonsense.

On: Reduce the Toxicity of Social Media

[joshbaskin]

As the father of two daughters who have launched a full scale attack on me for a smart phone, this article was a real eye opener.

I'd greatly appreciate any other insight you guys have on making social media a more positive experience for teens.